International land deals: who is investing and where - get the data

Workers at a palm oil plantation in Ethiopia. The data shows that east Africa has the highest concentration of recent land deal investments. Photograph: José Cendon/Getty Images Jose Cendon/Getty Images

Over the past few years, so-called "land grabs" have become an increasingly hot topic. But reliable data has been hard to find. Now, an international coalition of NGOs and research groups has published the world's largest database of deals struck since 2000, offering unprecedented detail on who's investing, where and what for.

The database, launched on Thursday, includes 1,006 deals covering 70.2m hectares (173m acres) – or roughly half the size of western Europe. Data on further deals will be added on an ongoing basis.

Some highlights from the database:

• Eastern Africa has the largest number of recent investments, with 310 deals.

• Indonesia is the country with the largest area of land acquired by investors – 9.5m hectares. The Democratic Republic of the Congo comes second, with almost 8.1m hectares.

• The Indian government, Chinese telecommunications firm ZTE International and Indonesian company Indah Kiat Pulp & Paper are the top three investors, having acquired more than 10m hectares around the world between them.

• The vast majority of the deals are for agricultural projects (690 deals covering 50.2m hectares). Forestry is the next largest sector (94 deals covering 12.7m hectares).

• Of the agricultural deals, fewer than 30% are for food crops alone. Almost 20% are for non-food crops such as biofuels and livestock feed.

The Land Matrix database is now the most comprehensive public source for information on international land deals – but it is not perfect. Some countries, for example, may be over-represented in the data simply because they are more transparent and routinely publish contract information. In other cases, the data may be skewed towards investors or countries that have featured in more media reports.

This makes it difficult to draw too many conclusions from the data. For example, there appears to be a sharp decline in deals since 2009 – but although this could correspond to a drop in investments, it could also be driven by a fall in media interest or an increasing reluctance to disclose information about deals.

Researchers warn that smaller deals are often harder to track and may be under-represented in the database. Data for deals struck after 2010 is still being collected, cross-checked and verified.

Researchers hope that releasing the data and inviting the public to crowdsource new information will help address some of these issues. The site lets users "report a land deal" or submit further details on deals already recorded. This information will be independently verified by researchers before being included in the database.

We have pulled out all the data on who's investing, where and what for. You can browse key figures below, or download the full dataset. What can you do with the data?

Data summary

Top 10 investors

Investor

Investor's Country

Hectares

Deals

Location of Investments

Indian Government

India

4877419

9

India, Ethiopia

ZTE International

China

2800000

1

DRC

Indah Kiat Pulp & Paper

Indonesia

2388468

1

Indonesia

Wuhan Kaidi

Unknown

2000000

1

Zambia

Tata Power

India

2000000

1

Indonesia

Samling Group

Malaysia

1838000

1

Malaysia

Al Ain National Wildlife

United Arab Emirates

1680000

1

Sudan

Daewoo Logistics

Republic of Korea

1600000

2

Madagascar

Sinar Mas Group

Indonesia

1600000

2

Indonesia

Muting Hijau

Indonesia

1100000

1

Indonesia

The Land Matrix project draws on a wide variety of sources, including media reports, information from companies and governments, and additional data from NGOs, academic research, and investigations around the world. Researchers are still in the process of verifying a large number of reported deals, and say they will add to the database on an ongoing basis.

Where land has been acquired (since 2000)

Country

Region

Hectares

Deals

Indonesia

South-East Asia

9527760

24

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Central Africa

8051870

10

Ethiopia

Eastern Africa

5345228

83

Philippines

South-East Asia

5182021

45

Malaysia

South-East Asia

4819483

20

India

South Asia

4628578

113

Sudan

Northern Africa

3923430

18

Brazil

South America

3871824

61

Madagascar

Eastern Africa

3779741

39

Zambia

Eastern Africa

2273413

9

United Republic of Tanzania

Eastern Africa

2194975

58

Mozambique

Eastern Africa

1983127

92

Argentina

South America

1505020

22

Cambodia

South-East Asia

1154194

86

Russian Federation

Eastern Europe

1113434

11

China

Eastern Asia

1108396

12

Benin

Western Africa

1040900

9

Cameroon

Central Africa

710340

17

Liberia

Western Africa

679000

6

Ghana

Western Africa

669900

9

Ukraine

Eastern Europe

662167

7

Kenya

Eastern Africa

633500

13

Sierra Leone

Western Africa

588950

11

Mali

Western Africa

581891

27

Peru

South America

571900

26

Lao People's Democratic Republic

South-East Asia

478153

49

Colombia

South America

420820

14

Australia

Australia and New Zealand

400926

3

Nigeria

Western Africa

362532

21

Malawi

Eastern Africa

310147

7

Senegal

Western Africa

234800

8

Côte d'Ivoire

Western Africa

207200

5

Zimbabwe

Eastern Africa

201171

2

Angola

Central Africa

183000

4

Viet Nam

South-East Asia

156540

7

Congo

Central Africa

138000

2

Guatemala

Central America

81006

10

Papua New Guinea

Melanesia

79178

1

Uganda

Eastern Africa

76512

4

Mexico

Central America

56581

5

Bolivia (Plurinational State of)

South America

37156

4

Niger

Western Africa

29969

3

Bangladesh

South Asia

29456

2

Thailand

South-East Asia

28912

3

South Africa

Southern Africa

27124

3

Somalia

Eastern Africa

21500

2

Swaziland

Southern Africa

15124

2

Ecuador

South America

8000

1

Costa Rica

Central America

7658

5

Solomon Islands

Melanesia

7577

1

Pakistan

South Asia

5926

3

Turkey

Middle East

4500

1

Rwanda

Eastern Africa

3100

1

Chile

South America

1400

2

Suriname

South America

1073

2

Burkina Faso

Western Africa

1000

1

The Land Matrix project draws on a wide variety of sources, including media reports, information from companies and governments, and additional data from NGOs, academic research, and investigations around the world. Researchers are still in the process of verifying a large number of reported deals, and say they will add to the database on an ongoing basis.